Using tech to help students review their writing

One of my big focuses as a teacher is giving students tools they can use without me. I've given many students checklists and models that they have later thanked me for as they used them throughout many later classes.

Besides those paper tools, I also give my students some electronic tools for reviewing their papers, e-mails, articles and really any written work. None of these are a replacement for a second set of eyes, but it is nice to have technology help out.

Most of these are Freemium meaning they offer services for free, but offer more or better services (without advertisements, less wait, etc.)

Below I'll give links and brief descriptions to four sites I give my students. Try them out with your own writing and share them with your students! I bet one or two of them will thank you.

1. Grammarly

If you sign up here you get to try Premium for a week (full disclosure I get a free week if you sign up with this link). Premium is nice, but I find the free version is definitely great too.

There's a Grammarly browser add-on (for Chrome, Firefox or Safari), a Microsoft Word add-on, and students can go to the site and copy and paste text to check it.

My favorite part though, is the weekly e-mails students get. Grammarly sends an e-mail once a week that lays out spelling and grammar issues they encounter most often.

Students can combine this with NoRedInk and practice any grammar skills they still struggle with on their own.

2. PaperRater

This site does have a lot of ads, but it's a great time to teach some digital citizenship in being careful what you click on. Students copy their text and then go to PaperRater. Once there, they paste their text into PaperRater filling out their specifics (type of text, grade level, etc.). The site looks at several different elements: Spelling, Grammar, Word Choice, Style, Vocabulary and Words. Then it gives a grade.

Obviously, this isn't perfect! For style it looks a lot at transitional phrases. For Word Choice it basically identifies words like "a lot, I don't, big, don't, get, really, many, am, go, most" and reminds students to consider other words or use a thesaurus.

A big thing to go over with students is that the grade is automated and that it definitely isn't a crystal ball that will predict that grade they earn.

3. Hemingway Editor

Reminding students that bigger isn't always better, Hemingway looks at sentence length, adverb usage, passive voice, and just awkward phrases to make writing easier to read.

While PaperRater also looks at sentence structure, most students get focused on the spelling, grammar, and grade. Hemingway focuses exclusively on structure. Spelling and grammar errors are irrelevant.

Hemingway Editor is definitely a site worth introducing to students. There is a time and a place for adverbs, passive voice and complex sentences, but this site's easy color coding can help students see if they have too many of one color populating their essay.

4. The Writer's Diet

Last but not least, there's The Writer's Diet. Based on the book by the same name, the site encourages writers to have "fit" writing rather than "flabby" writing.

After copying and pasting a text, students' are given a bar chart detailing a breakdown of their text and then the text itself.

There you are! Four more digital tools that students can store in their toolbox.

I am always sure to discuss all of these with my students. In fact often when first introducing them I have them run their text through and make changes. Then they give me a little write-up  which site they used, what was helpful, and what was not so helpful. This helps build a critical eye and students get an idea of when to use which site.

These are meant to be helpful tools, but they should be used with a critical eye. These are all automated and none of them perfect!

Do you know of any others I should add to my list? Have any experience you'd like to share? Let me know in the comments!

Quizlet Live 101

I am a long time user of Quizlet. I adore it for independent practice, and while I have sometimes tried to play their games in class (using a white board and volunteer), it hasn't been the easiest.

Just this week I got the e-mail about Quizlet live and I was PSYCHED.

My students and I had just read Gabriel Marquez' The Handsomest Man in the World, and we had about ten minutes left of class. I told them I wanted to try out a new site and asked if they wanted to give it a shot with me. They said sure

So, with very little prep and almost no time reviewing the vocabulary words. I jumped onto Quizlet! Within minutes my students were ready to play (either on laptops or cell phones), and by the end of class (seven minutes later), they were all up and out of their desks near their team actively cheering each other on and  mastering vocabulary together. SUCH A GREAT moment.

If you're a video person, here's a video of how it works.


In short

What is it?
A game students can play in teams that helps them review vocabulary together.

What do I need?
Each student needs internet connection and their own device. Cell phones, tablets, etc all worked fine when we tried.

Is is like Kahoot? Do they need to see my board/screen?
No! Unlike Kahoot, students will be looking at their screen and their screen only, so there's no need for a projector.


How do they win?For every answer they get right they get a point. If they get an answer wrong they lose all their points and start again. The first team to answer every word correctly WINS! The risk of getting zeroed out keeps them from randomly guessing, and keeps the students who are slower still in the game until the very end.

How is this different than other online games we already play?
This is similar to many teacher games in that the students do NOT need a login (wohoo!). This game requires more teamwork than other games. I have used Kahoot and Socrative for group work before, but Quizlet Live students CANNOT play without a group. Granted, they don't need to collaborate with their group. When my students started and the game said to move and sit with their groups they declined... that seemed like a lot of work. However, minutes of the game starting, they were walking around trying to fin their group to help one another.I was (pleasantly) shocked.

Can I use it as a test?I wouldn't. However, at the end it does tell you what words students are confusing and what words students understand. So, it can be used a way for you to evaluate how your class is doing.


How do I do it?
The video will walk you through it. I threw my students in the deep end and they managed to swim, but to make things run a bit smoother I probably would have done the Quizlet demo with them the first time.

There you go! A student tested and teacher approved game that can require very little prep (similar to Kahoot you can use public Quizlets that others have created). To be the best part is that students can continue using Quizlet individually to review if they realized in class they need more practice.

So Cal Bloggers Winter Freebie Blog Hop -All Summer in A Day

Can you tell I LOVE San Diego?

My Dutch View

For those that don't know, I spent the vast majority of my twenties living abroad. I adored hopping from place to place.

I LOVED actually living new cultures and really getting to know different cities and the cultures that make them unique.  I got to live in The Netherlands, Spain, Korea, Turkey, Mexico and visit so many more wonderful places!

For a long time it was really hard for anyone to think of me as coming home for more than a summer. I lived in such GORGEOUS places with such wonderful people and got to visit other countries at the drop of a hat! What's not to love?

 Nonetheless, a special part of my heart was always in San Diego. This blog hop is filled with other teachers who share my love! For those of you who have been hopping, you know the drill! Each blogger will share why they LOVE Souther California, and then link to a freebie. Once you've snagged it, you can keep hopping to the next teacher! There are SIXTEEN for teachers from third through eighth grade, so that's plenty of freebies for you.

Plus, there's a contest, so be sure to read until the bottom!

Yummm!

Two years ago I moved back home and I couldn't be happier. While my all time favorite part of living here is my family, I'll be honest and say the thing that I missed the most when abroad was the food! It isn't just the quality of food in Southern California, but the variety.

I LOVE that I can have Vietnamese pho for breakfast, then hit a Mexican (as in Mexico City) place for Micheladas, and have Ethiopian food for dinner (not pictured). What an AWESOME place to live, right?

Of course it isn't just the food, I also adore the diversity my classroom brings. I love when I ask students who are studying Martin Luther King if anyone has been to a Baptist church and hands spring up!

When we study the rhetoric used in poems about immigration, many of my students can tell their own stories of coming to America!

But the best part is that San Diego has COMPLETELY spoiled me with awesome weather! I am a big wimp for anything under 80 degrees! Sadly so it my cat. When the weather gets cooler he is the first to curl up by the fireplace or heater despite his fur.

This was me in November!

As a result, I figured I'd offer a freebie that most teachers can use whether they be teaching third grade or tenth! All Summer In a Day is a great short story to read especially if there's a blizzard or rain pouring! Students can really get into the characters' brains as they long for sunshine.

I use ink pinks with my fast finishers. I create a bunch before each unit that use the vocabulary words in our unit.

For example here's an All Summer in a Day packet that includes an Ink Pink worksheet. I have taught All Summer in a Day to fifth grades through high school! It is a simple short story, but filled with figurative language, topic starters and a great lesson for any ages.

As for the Ink Pinks, you can do these as a class, or use them for fast finishers. Despite their juvenile appearance, they are GREAT at helping students use their critical thinking skills and, depending n the level, reinforce or introduce new vocabulary.  Download your free page here and have fun!

 

Well I hope you had fun! Hopefully you've enjoyed the freebies you have found so far. The next blog is with Teacher Ms. H has one too. Check out her blog to see what she loves about San Diego and find her freebie.

Don't forget to enter for your chance to win!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Chain Game - Links for Fast Finishers

When I was younger I often kept myself amused with a pen and a piece of paper.

I would select two words composed of the same number of letters and see how quickly I could transform them from one to the other.

To make it more fun normally the words would be opposite, or funny. For example, "How many steps does it take to get from wheat-bread?"

wheat--cheat-cheap-cheep-creep-creed-breed-bread

As you can see, the rules are simple. You change one letter of the word, but it has to create a word. 

I can change wheat-cheat, but not wheat-wheap.

I don't remember how I learned this, but in high school I found out it was actually a word puzzle invented by Lewis Carroll!

You can download his original writing, Doublets A Word Puzzle by Lewis Carroll for free. I don't follow the exact rules, but it is an interesting read and it has lots of examples you can use.

I rarely use this activity as an "assignment" but I do introduce and use it for fast finishers.

Can you spot the error in this graphic? Keep reading to see what I'd do

At the start of the year we go over how to play. From then on every week I write two new words at the top of the board. If at any point in the week students finish early they can attempt to connect the words in the fewest words possible.

For example, I may write: Cat-Dog

One student may submit: Cat-Hat-Hot-Dot-Dog 5 links

And another student submits Cat-Cot-Dot-Dog 4 links

The "winner" is the person who completes it with the fewest changes. In this case the second person wins.

To add a vocabulary aspect, I have the students define and write a sentence with each word. Their submission is not valid if it includes a non word, or a fake definition. (update: 6/12) I am relatively lenient with the definition. As you can see in the example above, the student defined bare incorrectly.

Bare should mean naked or uncovered. They mixed it up with bear to carry or hold. However, the sentence could be seen as correct: the right to "naked" or not-immensely altered weapons. Most importantly to me, it is an "academic" sentence that means they probably paid attention in a Social Studies class (where one of the teachers at my school discusses how some people argue that people should have the right to bare weapons, but not AK47s). As a result, I would probably leave a short note here, but not disqualify them. However, you can be as strict as you need to be. Many teachers would not allow that word to pass leave a note about homophones and declare the winner a different student.Which hopefully means student one will have learned a valuable distinction! 

Whenever a student finishes their work early they can tinker with their word chain to see if they can cut a step out or try a different approach to get a smaller number.

Here's a copy of the worksheet in case you'd like to use this with your class. This is free for the next 5 days! After June 15th, the price will be adjusted.

Using Small Words to Define Big Ideas

I am an xkcd fan! I am not nerdy enough to be good at math and science, but I am a language nerd which means I still enjoy all things nerdy.

I recently discovered he wrote a book called the Thing Explainer: Complicated Stuff in Simple Words. The concept is similar to simple wiki, which explains things using a non-technical vocabulary. Although, unlike simple wiki he limited himself  to only using the 1,000 most common words and his drawings of course..

Thus, datacenters are referred to as computer buildings, tectonic plates becomes the flat rocks we live on, airliner cockpit controls are the things you use to steer a plane, and cells are referred to as the little bags of water you're made of.

You can see an example of this concept to the right with a plan of the Saturn V being described using only the most common, "ten hundred" words.

What's the connection?
How is this related to English class?  Here's my theory. Students are often overwhelmed by the vocabulary as much as the size of a text. So, why not, on occasion, have them really break it down.

Yes, knowing the literary terms: protagonist, foil, and hyperbole are important, but do they really know what they mean or are they regurgitating vocabulary you've covered.

You could do this with any vocabulary, but since I am in the midst of planning for next year literary terms springs to my mind. If you aren't on Summer break right now, maybe you would want to do this a review before the end of the semester exams come around.

How
1. Have students come up with a list of words they learned last year, or give them a list of words they should know.

2. Pass out a list of the top 1,000 words in English

• If you are a tech savvy class you can send them to the link you want to use. I like wiktionary, but there are many others.

3. Have students define the assigned words using ONLY the tip 1,000 words.

• I would probably do think pair share or pyramids here. 
• Students start on their own, then share with a partner, then two groups of partners get together) etc.

4. Finally ask for volunteers and see how well their definitions fit? Did they define a protagonist as a good guy? Is that really accurate?

Use the Short Answer function for students to submit and vote for definitions

5. Collect the definitions of the words and on Socrative, postits, etc. have students consider which definitions they like best.

6. Make a "literary terms" dictionary (in the spirit of the assignment call it a "Book about Book Words." Keep it in the class library, or save it and have it available online. Either way students will now be able to consult and know the words you plan on using in class.


Why?
I like the concept of this activity for several reasons, but here are the big ones:

It uses critical thinking. Maybe they want to say dramatic irony is when "the audience knows something the characters don't" Audience isn't a word, so they need to think of how else they would describe them, "People who listen or read know things the people in the book don't know." Since I teach the ELL students this is also a great example of circumlocution.Which is the process we go through when we need to talk around a word.

I am sure you do this a lot with movie stars or book titles. You are talking to your friends about a great old movie you saw the other day and you can't remember the name. You don't just stop talking, you describe it, "It has that actress we both like from Gilmore Girls, but not Patty...and she falls in love with the guy from that Trident commercial who looks like your cousin." etc.

When students learn they can describe almost anything using these words, they should have more confidence writing and speaking in class. Plus, it gives you a chance to confirm if they do in fact understand the vocabulary.

What do you think? I'd imagine you spend most of your class time getting students to use bigger words, would you ever do an activity like this that used smaller words?

Speed Dating

Here are my students during their most recent speed dating class

Speed dating is not a new trick for teachers. I used to use it a lot for class warm ups or bell ringers. The assignment varies a bit, but essentially, students talk and listen to a partner for a set period of time, then they switch partners and repeat.

Types of Assignments
This works well for grammar or vocabulary practice. These can be the same story thing and over, or you can give each partner a card with a different question. For example, I could have each students give a mini biography of themselves to practice  simple past tense: I grew up in San Diego, I went to Santa Sophia Academy, etc. Or, I could have each student have a question that they ask their partner. Some may ask about family, others about travels, etc.

In the picture above my Speech students are working on practicing their historical speeches (students were each given a speech to memorize and present to the class) Since they didn't need to write a speech, they could focus on tone, gestures, volume, etc This was a great way to have a lot of them practice to new listeners rather than listen to the same speech over and over.

Pros

It is different! Some students may get nervous when they see the new seats (even if they knew it was coming), but in the end something new is good for their neurons and their interest in the class.

It is rather hands off. As a teacher I can walk around and watch almost all of the students. They require very little interaction from me.

It is fast paced. Students don't get bored. They are always on the move.

Cons

For the most part this can be adapted to any number, but on occasion I have an assignment where I need it to work with an even number. In this case, I put a desk in the middle and have a student practice on their own, or work on a reflection. In one case I used it as a chance to have quick mini-conferences with that student.

It doesn't lend itself to an "in-n-out" class. By that I mean, if you have students who are coming in late, or being pulled out in the middle of your class it really messes up the flow of class. Try to keep this for a day that you think things will run pretty smoothly.

Tips and Tricks
Have fun with it! Before starting have students sit in front of the class and play "charades." Have them pick dating faux pas like texting on a date, talking over your date, falling asleep on your date, not making eye contact, etc. Include some positive things as well: leaning forward, smiling, nodding your head, etc. Students will love watching one another ham it up in front of the class, and you'll be able to have good behaviors modeled and encouraged.

Give the listener a reason to listen. Either let them know that they will be telling about what they hear, they will be tested on it, or they will need to evaluate their partners. Something to keep them accountable. Real speed dates usually end with people turning in requests for dates, so why not have your students turn in whether or not they'd want to hear the speech again with a quick reason why.

I set up the tables before the students arrive. I put two different colors of tape on the board with numbers with a note to grab a number and sit in the matching seat. This isn't really needed but I find, "inner circle" and "outer circle" confuse the students, but if I say, "read tape" and "blue tape," then they all get it immediately.

Keep everyone moving! Normally in speed dating one group of people (e.g. ladies) will stay seated the whole time while others will rotate around them. My students are all equally antsy. To keep people seeing different partners, I alternate rotations Those on the inside of the circle rotate to counterclockwise one time, and the next time the outer circle moves clockwise.

Concluding Remarks
This is a great highly active way to practice...and we know so much of language and speaking is "Practice, Practice Practice"  

My students' homework is to practice their speech. I like the addition that they made to the board

A photo posted by carissa (@clarissasinel) on May 8, 2015 at 6:02pm PDT

Does anyone else use speed dating in their class? Do you have any other suggestions, tips or tricks? Comment below or let me know on Twitter or Facebook.

Vocabulary Group Work

Happy Dance

Today was a good day!

I've been playing around with different seating charts since the beginning of the year. It has been tumultuous; we have had new students join the class, and some students go back to their home countries. Plus, the class has some very strong personalities.

Many of my past seating charts have been OK, but today I implemented "the one." It just worked! Students were collaborating on tasks (not just dividing up questions), they all stayed in English, and, most importantly, they actually stayed on task!

I was beyond thrilled. Today's lesson was a simple one, but to see it go so well made me ecstatic. My class is reading The Great Gatsby. Since this is a rather difficult text for ESL students, I took some time to pre-teach the vocabulary. I picked ten words that they need to know and we used them in the activity.

STEP 1- Modeling

I select one word from the chapter and use it as a sample. 

Contemptuous: showing contempt; scornful.

Since we can't use a word to define itself we look up contempt together

A combination of disgust and anger

Now we make a definition that anyone in the class would understand: When someone/something shows disgust and anger towards someone or something

To show they understand the word, they need to create a dialogue using the word. 

• I usually need to remind them that dialogues are exchanges, meaning at least three lines between at least two people.

Then we "play" Whose Line is it Anyways? I ask the class what type of people would be talking that may be contemptuous. They shout out ideas, and I pick the ones that are the most outlandish (or easiest). Then I ask them to shout out a situation. They usually can't just shout out answers, so this is fun for them, but if you want, you can use this as a time to get shyer students to communicate by calling on them. 

• Me: What types of people do we want to be talking? Who would make you feel contemptuous or be contemptuous?
• Student 1: Teacher 
• Student 2: Coach
• Student 3: Dentist
• Student 4: Doctor
• Me: Awesome! Let's go with dentist. Where should the dentist be?
• Student 5: Office
• Student 6: Restaurant
• Student 7: House
• Me: Ooo, let's have him at the restaurant, So, I can say:

Waiter: Would you like to see the dessert menu?

Dentist: Is there anything sugar free?

Waiter: No, we believe in using lots of sugar.

Dentist: How dare you do such a thing? Sugar is a silent killer!

Dentist's wife: Dear stop being so contemptuous to the waiter. It isn't like he makes the menus.   

Once they understand the concepts

STEP 2- Assignment 

• Each group is assigned one word. Be sure not to assign all of the words. You'll need one word not assigned to a group for Step 3. 
• They need to look up their word, define it, and create a dialogue that they will present to the class.
• Dialogues can be on ANY topic. This freedom really lets students have a little fun with it.

In my class I try to focus a lot on the difference between, "dividing and conquering" and collaborating. This is best done as a collaboration! Everyone pitches in and brings their own ideas to the table.

STEP 3- The Twist

• Take the word that you haven't given to a group and tell the class you will be modeling what they will present to the class.



The twist!

• Teacher in a deeper voice: What makes you think your boyfriend is cheating on you. Did he tell you? 
• Teacher in a higher voice: No, but there were clear intimations
• Teacher in a deeper voice: Like what?
• Teacher in a higher voice: He didn't always answer his phone, and he stopped using my name. He always called me, "Baby," or "Sweetie."
• Ask students what they think the word intimation means? 
• Field guesses and help them come to the correct definition if they can't figure it out on their own.
• Explain that they will be presenting their dialogues FIRST and then helping the rest of the class figure out the meaning. 
• Give them a little (I did two minutes) more time to make sure their dialogues are ready or to practice.

This is the part that makes the lesson really interactive. Students aren't just presenting to the class; they're helping them discover what the word really means. The rest of the class isn't just taking notes; they are trying to guess!

STEP 4- Listening

• As each group presents, the rest of the class listens and guesses what the word means.
• I hardly had to give any guidance today, but feel free to help your students focus or give them clues if they struggle. 

STEP 5- Final Product

• Students take all of the words presented (including the two from their teacher) and make either a short story or another dialogue. 
• If you want to add a technological aspect, you can have them make a comic stop on bistrips
• There's a short story app for Windows 8.1 and higher called Chekov
• You can also choose to make it a speaking task by using the sock puppet free app 
• And many many more! 
• I refuse to give more help with the definitions. If a student asks what a word means, I ask the group who originally presented on it to help. Otherwise, I point out the dictionaries sitting in the middle of the group's table.

Voila! Your students should feel fairly comfortable with these words, They've worked in a group, presented to the class, listened to others, and practiced writing.

Again, this isn't a new concept or activity, but it worked so well today I wanted to share it.

Artistically Challenged Pictionary

Thanks to The Doghouse Diaries for this great comic. It IS how my students play sometimes.

I think most language teachers know how to play pictionary with their class. It is a very popular party game and has really clear applications to language teachers. For those that don't you can follow the directions from the comic (hehe), or the SUPER basic set of directions that follow:

1. Give a student randomly select a word (usually a vocabulary word).
2. Have them try to draw it on the board. 
3. Other students guess the word.

Now, you can add variations (divide it into teams, have it timed, say they can't draw any circles, etc.) to make it more difficult or more fun.

I always feel a little bad when playing pictionary because...well... this is an example of my wonderful work. 

Post by Melted ELT Activities.

Alfred Sisley - Flood at Port-Marly

It isn't bad! In fact most people will look at it and say, "flood."  However, many of my students are INCREDIBLY talented and will end up drawing something like the image to the right in about 30 seconds.

As a result, even though the vast majority of students LOVE playing pictionary some students get discouraged because they just don't have the artistic skills to have fun. They get stressed about letting their team down, or people not guessing what they drew properly.

I even have a few talented artists who get discouraged because the white board "limits their abilities" (I have found that whiteboard crayons help).

The category card with the child options

So the other day when I was shopping I was super excited to find Pictionary... the CARD GAME for sale! I live in Mexico at the moment, so the game was technically in Spanish, but that isn't important since the main point of the game (for me) is that it is all pictures. I tend to create my own clues for students.

The category card with the adult options

To start, there's a category card you can use to show if it is movie related, TV related, music related, or something else.
Then there are the "clue cards" these are what people have to guess. In this case mine are all in Spanish, but if you buy the English version your would be in English! Regardless, I would probably create my own to fit my classes level and knowledge.

The nice thing about the clue cards is they are arranged into two categories: children and adults. The children have four words surrounding a theme. For example, "Weather" is snow, air, cloud, and sunlight. Depending on how you play children can say the theme before they start to help others guess. Adults have four options: a movie related option, a TV related option, a song related option and a random word or phrase. 

Finally comes the drawing cards which are my personal favorite and why I am writing this blog. For example, take a look at the following cards and see if you can guess the movie:

A man with fire eyes

There is a lightening lady

A man with fork hands

Any guesses?

If you guessed X-men you are right!


The man with fork hands was supposed to be Wolverine, the lady with lightening was Storm and the man with fire eyes was Cyclops.

Now, if no one had guessed yet, I could have kept giving you hints! (Like the photo to the right).

There are 88 of these little drawing cards in a pack (44 red and 44 blue). The only thing I don't like about them is they are SO little! If you are having students work in small groups then this works fine, but if you want to do a full class review this would be impossible for everyone to see, but I LOVE that they even the playing field of artistic and non-artistic while encouraging students to be creative!

You have a few options as how to proceed.

1. If you have a doc cam, or a similar device, it would be easy to have students rearrange the cards on a table and display them larger for all the students to see. I am not that lucky, but I know a lot of teachers who have them, so make the most of it!

2. Even if you aren't artsy crafty, you can make your own cards! Part of the joy is that these don't require much artistic skills. They are just stick people, squiggles, and other easily drawn shapes. If you don't have the time to make them yourself, you could have students draw these one day as a listening activity. Save and laminate your favorites! Another option is to make a list of what you want and have students offer to make them for extra credit. It would show comprehension!

3. You can photocopy the cards so that they are bigger. My photocopier maxes out at 4x as big, and that makes them look like the picture to the right (which I think it big enough for the class to see). There aren't many details in the pictures so making them bigger doesn't really distort the image.

2/3 b If you are doing option 2 or 3 I suggest you laminate the cards and invest in some reusable adhesive so students can easily stick them on the board / wall for everyone to see.


If you are as artistically challenged as I am, I hope this post helped you.. If you have students who hate pictionary because they are like me, I hope you will consider this as an option.

Finally, even if you and your students are extremely gifted, I would encourage you to try this out. It gets students to really think creatively about how to use the cards to express their word. So many of my students are intelligent, but their creativity is still weak. Games like this will hopefully help them work their creativity muscles so they can think outside the box in real life!

If you don't think these cards could be used to make YOUR classes vocabulary words I'm happy to show you what I would do. Comment below (or on facebook) with the vocabulary word from your class, and I'll show you what Pictionary Cards I would use to describe your word!

Jenga in the classroom

Everyone loves playing Jenga. If you watch the video below even cats fall victim to this addicting game! 

How can we take this fun game and make it educational?

There are several ways!

To start: I usually play Jenga with students AT LEAST in groups of two. This way they can help one another. Remember that Jenga technically can be played with unlimited players, but in order to keep students involved I suggest no more then 4 groups.


1. Make it part of a review game.

• Divide your class into two-four teams.
• Have students alternate coming to the front of the class
• Ask a review question. 
• The first student to answer the question correctly wins two point for their team
• Then comes the Jenga... there's a few ways to do this
• They can choose if they want to pull a block, or have the other team pull a block
• They can pull a block, if they get the answer right then the opposition has to put the block on the top. If they got the answer wrong their team has to put the block on the top.
• You can make it point based by assigning a point value to the blocks gets one point, but if you make the tower tumble your team loses 10 points!
• Alternatively, you can just make it so the first team to make the tower fall loses.

2. Make it conversational

• Put conversation questions on the Jenga blocks. 
• You can use a label maker to do this
• The blocks are 1.5 × 2.5 × 7.5, so you can also use labels you can print from the computer.
• Alternatively, you can write directly on the block in sharpie (or other permanent marker). Some teachers use pencil so they can reuse the blocks later.
• Each time a student pulls the block they need to answer the question AND ask it to someone else.
• Depending on the level these can be easy questions (what's your favorite food) or harder questions (If you met God tomorrow what three questions would you ask and why?)
• An alternative would be to make this similar to truth or dare. Have a "dare" on one side, and a "truth" on the other. If the student doesn't want to answer the question they can do the dare. Keep them English related! Have them mime a vocabulary word, or sing a verse of their favorite English song.

Photo by Edgarc2

3. Use it for vocabulary practice

•  Start a story and then have a child pull the block. 
• Using the word they pull they have to continue the story. 
• If the tower falls they need to quickly end the story
• While you are telling the story have the whole class write their own version using the blocks pulled. See how many different stories you get at the end!
• This is GREAT with transition words (First, Then, After, Thus, etc.)

4.  Make it a station / center!
If you use stations   (or centers) in the classroom, I think you can easily see how this would be a great station for small groups of students.

• If you want to be able to use one Jenga game with multiple subjects you can have each of the blocks have a number. This number can correspond to a worksheet that the students have with different questions / vocabulary words.
• Students work together to try to answer as many questions as they can!
•  An alternative to questions is to have them work with grammar. For example, if you were working on tag questions perhaps you would write out things like, "Do you own a car?- Negative" and students would need to change it to, "You don't own a car, do you?"

5. For pronunciation

Photo By:  jam343

• If you notice your students are  struggling with some minimal pairs or a tricky sound have this game focus on that!
• This is a free download that has words focusing on S / R made into ready to print labels.
• This printable is setup for K and G. Rather than write on the blocks, it is suggested that you color them and let students grab the matching card to practice. 

6. Treat it like science!

• There's a great freebie on TPT using Jenga to help with inference. This idea is great to help students with expressing their opinions, and thoughts. 
• Because I know this, I think this will happen.
• Also great to have students practice making predictions! 

7. Alphabet Jenga

• This isn't the most academic Jenga, but it is easy and fun. Have students randomly select a category (food, sports, countries, clothing, verbs, animals etc.).
• I normally put them in pairs and they can help their partner.
• When they pull a block they need to say a word in that category with their letter.
• Letters can go in turn (A first, then B, then C, etc.)
• Letters can be written on the block. 
• In this case it can be fun to have the letters written on the square outside that students can see. This way they have some time to think of a word before they select it. They also need to think about location as well as which letters are easier.
• I tend to use the game like this for fast finishers, or if I am having a game day in the class. It could be used with stations / centers for vocabulary practice.  

BONUS!

Make any of these games even more fun by using a GIANT jenga set. Simply ask parents / students for donations of empty "fridge boxes" normally filled with soda. When you get enough (27-30 boxes) you can cover them with wrapping paper, or to try to mimic the appearance of the original Jenga set use contact paper designed to look like wood! Check out LockInLoaded's Blog for a sample of the finished product. Students will love playing with a big set, and if you use any of the games listed above they'll still be learning!
 
There you go seven different ways to use Jenga in the classroom! As you can see many of these ideas could be used for math, science, social studies or any other class! A lot of these are perfect for the end of the year, so I hope you enjoy yourselves!